Happy January! Now is that beautiful time of year where we’ve counted down to a new year full of promise, and we all still fully believe that we can be different people because now there’s a new number when you write the date. No matter what your resolution is this year, there is an app for that. Here are some of my favourite apps (and a few sites and tutorials) for fitness, brain goodness, and crafts.
Physical Fitness
Zwift
Zwift is the app you use when you don’t want to ride your bike/run outside because it’s either too hot or too cold. With the right indoor trainer or treadmill, it can give you a workout that’s as close to the real thing as possible. It keeps you on track with a community and challenges, and is generally a good time.
Apple Fitness+
Fitness+ is my go-to for when I’m travelling for work, or can’t make it to the gym, and it’s also the main app I recommend to beginners. You have to be an Apple user to get it, which does limit the audience a little, but the platform features the slickest workout videos I’ve seen on any platform. The production values are good, the trainers are encouraging and enthusiastic, there are plenty of training options, and there are also programs to suit people who are new to exercise, pregnant people, older people, and various other goals. It’s easy to use and good.
Strava
Strava is my outdoor cycling and running tracking app of choice at the moment. There’s a lot to love about, but my favourite is how easy it is to look up popular routes around you, so you can find new places to run or ride almost any distance. I find that one of the most difficult things about running or riding is getting sick of doing the same route every time, but not always feeling confident enough to find a new path you’re not sure has been tested. This takes some of that mystery out of it.
It’s also nice being able to use it as a kind of social media to help keep friends accountable, encourage each other, and make friends with people who ride in the same places you do. Plus, if you’re a competitive person, you can compete for king/queen of the mountain, and compete on segments.
Mental Fitness
Lumosity
Lumosity is designed to help you improve your problem-solving skills, memory and other really important brain workouts. The website has lots of quotes from doctors talking about how helpful the app can be, but I haven’t been using it long enough to be able to comment on whether there’s been any kind of concrete improvement. It’s fun, though, kind of like those Nintendo Brain Training games, but with a bit more variety, and an optional subscription fee. I find the games fun, and I’d certainly like to improve my memory, so I hope it works. It’s unlikely to hurt you, and hopefully it helps.
Duolingo
There is a lot of debate about whether Duolingo actually helps you learn a language, or just gets you to memorise as assortment of words and get really good at pattern recognition. Despite my 744-day streak, I still can’t speak Portuguese. But I have picked up some useful phrases, I can recognise some words and sentences when I watch movies with Portuguese (the English subtitles in Love Actually are totally wrong, by the way, Colin Firth mostly nailed that proposal). The secret is finding people with whom you can practice the language. I certainly speak a lot more Portuguese than I did before I started Duolingo, and I think we all know that people likely to use Duolingo are unlikely to suddenly sign up for an immersion language course instead, so it’s better than nothing.
Making memories
Journal
The new Journal app in iOS17 is a really good, simple way to get you to write a little in a journal each day/each time you feel like it. I’ve tried to write a diary so many times over the years and never stuck with it because I felt like I never had anything profound to say (and on days when I did, I had too much to just put in a diary). What I like about the Journal app is that it encourages you to write a little something about a photo you took, a place you went, a workout you did, or a song you listened to. It takes the pressure off having to pick a topic, or being too profound, and just gets you to think about your day. It’s good.
Penzu
What I like about Penzu is that it’s secure, and cross-platform. It’s more protected than the unicorn journal you got as a kid and used until your brother broke the lock and told everyone about your secret crush. It has strong WordPress vibes, so it might remind people a bit too much of work, but it also means that it’s pretty easy to use off the bat.
Getting into crafts
Look, neither of these are apps, and we’re just going to accept that.
Bella Coco
This is the YouTube channel that basically taught me how to crochet last year. She’s a good teacher, easy to follow, and it turns out crochet is easier than you think it is.
Ravelry
This is the best site to get patterns for knitting and crochet, both free and paid. It’s good and you need it. You can find all kinds of cool stuff to make there.
Another thing to note, before you go, is that even if you don’t stick with your resolution, or it doesn’t work out how you planned, that doesn’t mean that it wasn’t worth trying. Energy spent working towards a goal is never wasted, passion is not misspent just because you changed your mind later. New skills learned, or PBs reached are worth celebrating in their own right, even if your original goal no longer fits in the framework of how you want to live. You can do, or do not, but it’s always worth trying.